FS7: New Sony F7 XDCAM 4K Super 35mm Camcorder

Your basic choice is Canon EF or Nikon.
One advantage of Nikon is that you can always adapt a Nikon lens to a Canon mount but not vice versa. However there are other considerations
None of these apply to Rokinon primes though because those lenses have mechanical irises without hard stops ( cine version anyway) and no IS. However there are real pros and cons to Zooms.

Pros of Nikon:
- All Nikon lenses even those without iris rings ( G lenses) can couple to a G adapter that has a mechanical coupling to the actual iris. This allows you to smoothly rack iris while shooting video without any stepping or needing to go into menus . Depending on the adapter you probably won't be able to see what your f-stop is and the control might be pretty loosey-goosey but it sure beats riding iris in 1/3 step increments.
- Seems to me its easier to get good quality Nikon zooms ( esp older ED glass ones) that are roughly parfocal at great prices. I've had 5 Nikon zooms that are all parfocal. Harder to find in Canon. But sometimes that requires being able to adjust the back focus of the camera - I could do it on an F3 but i don't think you can on FS7. However I think you can with with Speedbooster.
- Even if you went with an EF adapter , you can always put a Nikon lens in by coupling to a Nikon> EF adapter first.

Cons of Nikon
- Focus barrel turns the opposite way from standard and that can be confusing.
- No one makes a Nikon adapter that carries power so none of them will activate image stabilization, auto focus and you can't adjust iris in the menus which you might want to do with G lenses.

Pros of EF
- Many adapters power the Image Stabilization which is a very big deal to me
- Focus barrel is standard
- Because of the popularity of Canon DSLR's, EF lenses are even more common than Nikon among the video community.

Cons of EF
- all Iris's on zooms are electronic and therefore have stops. Maybe 1/6th stop if your lucky but not smooth.

I have all Nikon for my F3 but am considering going to EF for the FS7 because the EF to E adapters can activate Image Stabilization.
I might keep some Nikons though and just adapt them over to the EF mounts. I'll try it first anyway and see if its wanky.
I would like all my focus barrels to turn in the same direction though.

lenny
 
Sparky874 said:
Hi all. With all this excitement I just don't know why people don't see the F5 as being perfectly suited for run and gun, lightweight shoulder mount work. I mainly use a RED 17-50mm and RED 50-150mm glass on it, with some red rock micro handles on the front and a follow focus unit, and it sits on the shoulder really well, is balanced really well. The viewfinder is fantastic (the lcd one) and is so adjustable too. The F5 is small and really well built and pretty much does everything. Please don't look past the F5 if you're looking for a great docu camera - it's the best camera I have ever owned. Sparky
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I think part of the excitement has to do with the fact that this camera is $8k, and basically ready to go out of the box, while the F5 is $16k with no viewfinder or shoulder mounting built in. All-in cost for the F5 is a lot higher than FS7.
 
Yes.
The F5 is easily double cost.
Camera alone + pricier batteries, pricier memory cards, extra (and better) display/vf, pricier lens choice (FZ mount adapter are more expensive than E-mount)

plus the weight: The F5 fully rigged is about double the weight of the FS7.
If you want, the FS7 is small and lightweight. Just put a BP-U60 and two XQD-cards + one photo lens from Sony or Canon or whatever and you're good to go on shoulder in hand or on tripod. When I carried my FS100 with Canon 24-105/4L, 3 batteries and tripod alone for 2 weeks - up to 14h a day, I knew i never want a camera with PL-Mount and "pro" build quality...

Just my 2 c
 
Haha, I guess everything is relative - I consider the light weight of the F5(5) one of it's biggest appeals!
 
thorn said:
I'm coming from m4/3, and only have native lenses at the moment.

I'm considering going the Rokinon/CinePrime route... perhaps a 50 and 85. (I know primes are a different capability, in case someone points that out. ;) )Then there's the whole "which mount to get", but after a bit of forum searching it appears that going with the Nikon adapter seems like the most popular option? I know some/all of the ones I'm considering come in E-mount, but I'd rather not be locked into yet another proprietary format for future's sake, and see no inherent advantage to going E with Rokinon.
Click to expand...

If you're concerned with future proofing, technically Nikon is best since they can be adapted to Canon EF, but I don't think that's gonna matter. Just about every camera manufacturer makes a camera in Canon mount, or make a camera that can be adapted to Canon mount.
 
The body-only weight of the two cameras (FS7 vs. F5) are actually pretty close. FS7 is 4.4 lbs, and F5 is 4.88. The biggest weight difference probably comes from the V-lock battery, but even the Olivine battery is only 2.16 lbs vs. the BPU-60 is 0.94 lbs. BPU-90 is 1.39 lbs.

Assuming the lenses and accessories are identical, the cameras should end up within 3-4 lbs. of each other.
 
Grug said:
Haha, I guess everything is relative - I consider the light weight of the F5(5) one of it's biggest appeals!
Click to expand...

Yep. It is relative.

It depends on where you'll use your camera primarily. For me, the fully rigged F5 was never lightweight as a doco cam.
As a camera for ads and corporate stuff it's already lightweight and for fiction it's already a small camera.

In the end the FS7 can be much smaller and lighter if you just put a BP-U and a small non-cine lens like the Canon 17-55 on it.
Something between "handycam" and shoulder cam...

Can be exciting, can be dissapointing.

What I'm excited of, is the image part of the camera.
The s-gamut3.cine/s-log3 profile with several LUTs for internal and/or external displays is
something, I dreamed of, when I first saw nicely graded S-Log2 images from the F3.
It seems, that Sony worked it out now.

Really looking forward to test the capabilities of the S-Log3 workflow and its capabilities.
 
meauounji said:
The body-only weight of the two cameras (FS7 vs. F5) are actually pretty close. FS7 is 4.4 lbs, and F5 is 4.88. The biggest weight difference probably comes from the V-lock battery, but even the Olivine battery is only 2.16 lbs vs. the BPU-60 is 0.94 lbs. BPU-90 is 1.39 lbs.

Assuming the lenses and accessories are identical, the cameras should end up within 3-4 lbs. of each other.
Click to expand...

Where the display on the F5?
Where will you put the microphone?
Forgot the handle?
How can lenses be identical when there are different mounts?
F5 also needs some sort of shoulder pad...

It will be much heavier than the FS7 if you want the F5 to match the FS7.
But who will want that? The F5 is still another league. Much better build,
much better (and more expensive) display options, additional display for
cineEI and LUT or ISO adjustments and so on...

For me, these are not really comparable. I have the FS100 and wanted something new for 6 month now.
FS700 was never enough for an upgrade for me and I never wanted to fiddle with external reording a la O7Q.

C100/300 is still 8bit only and therefore to expensive for me. Still will need rig for shulder use.

The BM are not really made for doco - hence they make great images and are so cheap.

Aja CION is to big and also not made for the kind of available light doco I'm shooting.

F5 is just to expensive with VF and new batteries and memory cards and the expensive mount.

FS7 ticks al my boxes: Small and light enough, lens mount open for nearly every lens, 10bit internal, can be put on shoulder without extra stuff so that I can shoot in hand, on shoulder, against wrist.... all comes with a price cheaper than the FS700 was.

Still the F5 is the better build and more capable camera - but still doesn't tick my boxes...
 
Lenilenapi said:
Your basic choice is Canon EF or Nikon
Click to expand...

Len - Have you tried EF lenses - I mean really tried them for work?

I use nikkors.. and am happy NOT to recommend them due to the focus rotation but I would always suggest manual lenses.

There is just something about the focus on 'plastic' lenses that is horrid.

Personally I would be looking to contax, olympus or canonFD primes/zooms and then have one 'emergency' lens which could be a 24-105 canon or maybe something from sony like the 18-200

My fav combo is 28-85manual and a speed booster for RnG work - but I still carry the 18-200 too.

S
 
Sparky874 said:
Hi all. With all this excitement I just don't know why people don't see the F5 as being perfectly suited for run and gun, lightweight shoulder mount work. I mainly use a RED 17-50mm and RED 50-150mm glass on it, with some red rock micro handles on the front and a follow focus unit, and it sits on the shoulder really well, is balanced really well. The viewfinder is fantastic (the lcd one) and is so adjustable too. The F5 is small and really well built and pretty much does everything. Please don't look past the F5 if you're looking for a great docu camera - it's the best camera I have ever owned. Sparky
Click to expand...

The F5 IMO has a bunch of niggles.

-no 'at the finger' focus check
-no ability to use my fav glass combo of speedbooster 28-85 manual

Not to mention HFjack, lack of audio pots, XLR sticking out, weak EVF lead etc etc.

If they made a handle IMO the F5 would become a contender.

S
 
Sparky874 said:
Hi all. With all this excitement I just don't know why people don't see the F5 as being perfectly suited for run and gun, lightweight shoulder mount work. I mainly use a RED 17-50mm and RED 50-150mm glass on it, with some red rock micro handles on the front and a follow focus unit, and it sits on the shoulder really well, is balanced really well. The viewfinder is fantastic (the lcd one) and is so adjustable too. The F5 is small and really well built and pretty much does everything. Please don't look past the F5 if you're looking for a great docu camera - it's the best camera I have ever owned. Sparky
Click to expand...

Well I already own a Red Scarlet that at some point I'll upgrade to Epic Dragon, so wanted something that can handle all the jobs that might not immediately be the first choice for.
 
Eric thanks for that link.

What I find most interesting is something I have not seen before, wang the clips into the catalyst browser and you get options to de-log and even change temp tint et al.

That could finally be an 'official' 'one click' workflow Ive been looking for from log footage..

temp.jpg

Edit - a video..

S
 
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The Catalyst browser looks like a very good tool especially compared to other browsers sony has put out in the past.

I have been thinking of spec'ing out a laptop just to use Catalyst on set or on the road to process files rather than my usual dump and wait till back in office.
 
Its not really there with LightRoom or Resolve but AFAIK it is the first official method of de-loging Sony footy.

That is really big because you can pass log to a client and then give them a 'one step' method of delogging and turning to ProRes.

S
 
Erik Wittbusch said:
FS7 ticks al my boxes: Small and light enough, lens mount open for nearly every lens, 10bit internal, can be put on shoulder without extra stuff so that I can shoot in hand, on shoulder, against wrist.... all comes with a price cheaper than the FS700 was.
Click to expand...
And for doco work 4K is a killer function. I would say that probably bigger then for fiction, music or corporate stuff. But todays Canon announcement made my thoughts: maybe wait for their C300 successor?
 
alohype said:
And for doco work 4K is a killer function. I would say that probably bigger then for fiction, music or corporate stuff. But todays Canon announcement made my thoughts: maybe wait for their C300 successor?
Click to expand...

Do you think the C300II will have big upgrades or more of an Apple like 'spec bump' like the C100II?
 
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